Monthly Archives: December 2012

Welcome to 2013…

Sydney Australia is one of the first cities to celebrate NYE.. so there is a chance you are still counting down the hours. Myself and a buddy wanted to try some light painting to create a NYE photo… it was quite a laugh in the end. We decided to use sparklers rather than a static light source, and both of us had never really had any experience with light painting… We headed to a prominent harbour side location, with a plan of having the Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House in the background of our image.

We practiced first with a torch and then decided ‘what the heck’ and decided to take the plunge and start using the sparklers, we had 60 of them… how hard could it be?

Well, it was harder than we thought… it was windy, so getting the sparklers to light was our first challenge. We had to work out where to stand, how big to write, how slow to move etc etc… it was becoming a real mission! In the end, we both ended up with an image we were happy with… here is mine… HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Happy New Year

The Outtakes

As I said in the beginning… there was a lot of learning (screw ups!)…

Rene, had bought these other cool sparklers that were the actual numbers… we thought we would give them a go..

firstly, we needed to work out how to mount them, as we would not be able to hold them still enough for a clean shot, luckily, Rene is like MacGyver and has a multi-tool and gaffa tape at hand… so we tape them onto a piece of metal bar that Rene had in his car … that seemed to be easy enough.

Setting up the shot

Next we had to get the placement right… this looked good… we would use photoshop to remove the tripod and stuff later…

Adjusting the composition

All that was left to do was to light each number and capture our masterpiece… lighting them was easier said than done, so we decided we would light one at a time, and blend them in photoshop later… so here goes…

WTF??

As you can see… this was an EPIC fail… can you see the number 2? … me neither… at least we had some fun and learnt something about light painting with sparklers along the way…

Have a safe New Years eve and I wish that 2013 brings you much joy and success… thanks again for being a part of my photojourney in 2012, I personally love hearing of how I have helped and inspired you to get out and create your own photojourney and hope you can join me again in 2013!

Where are you for NYE?

Just 12 hours if you’re in Sydney… I am going to spend the eve with some of my good friends watching fireworks and enjoying a nice drinkie poo or two (or three), I hope you have something fun planned! Just after midnight I have something fun planned for you… I had fun making this special NYE image and I hope you like it too! Make sure you check in later to see what I am talking about…

The weather gods don’t always play nice

Getting up at 4am to shoot the sunrise is never easy, I, like most of you, would prefer to stay in bed and push out a few more zzz’s, so there is nothing worse than when I get out of bed at 4am and heading somewhere for a sunrise shoot, and it is raining and yuck… that is exactly what happened to me this morning!

Today’s iCandy – A Rocky Start

I took this on one of those mornings, you know, the ones that are wet and yucky. It just shows you that sometimes you can get lucky, that even when it’s raining and cloudy the sun sometimes makes a brief appearance…

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15% off is better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick!

I use Photomatix Pro to process most of my HDR photo’s, I have tried lots of HDR software and find Photomatix the best. Use the Coupon code ‘ON3LEGS’ for a 15% discount, you can get it from here -> Photomatix DOWNLOAD

Today’s iCandy – Old Church in Sydney

This old church in Sydney is marvellous! It has so much character and you are free to wander around and soak it all in… as you can see, no one else was in the church. There was this funny podium thing, and it was roped off, it took me a while, but I decided to just move the rope and climb to the top so I could get this shot… I am glad I did!

Click on the photo to order yourself a print or to download (please see licensing for the rules!)

9 Tips to better fireworks photo’s

With NYE fast approaching, you may be thinking of capturing your local fireworks display. There are a few ‘essentials’ to capturing fireworks…

1. Use a tripod

A tripod is a must… if you don’t have a tripod you can forget trying to capture the fireworks.

2. Arrive early to grab a good spot

You can be assured that people will stand up in front of you, this is one night where the camera is not going to deter people from blocking your shot, so make sure you get there early and stake your claim!

3. Set your ISO low

Set your camera to it’s base ISO, if you leave it on auto your camera will increase it and you will end up with ‘Noise’ in your images. Most camera’s will let you set ISO to 200, if you can, use ISO100.

4. Use Manual

If your camera has the ability, I suggest turning everything to manual. This way you can have complete control. Set your focus to infinity and your aperture to somewhere between f8 and f16

5. Long Shutter Speeds

Try using different shutter speeds, to capture the light trails you will need somewhere between 1 and 3 seconds at a minimum.

6. Use Black Cardboard

If your camera has a bulb setting, hold it open and use a black piece of cardboard in front of your lens as the shutter. This way you can get 2 or 3 bursts of fireworks in one frame.

7. Turn OFF your flash

A lot of cameras will automatically flash in the dark… flashers aren’t welcome at any NYE fireworks display… so turn it off…

8. Turn on NR

NR stands for Noise Reduction and if your camera has the ability, set this to on. The only down side of this setting is that it can take longer to save your image to the the memory card, if you find you’re missing the next shot because of this, then turn it off.

9. Use a cable release or the self timer

You want to avoid any vibration in your camera during each exposure, so the best way is to use a cable release (remote), if you don’t have one, then you can use the self timer, the only problem is that usually the minimum time for the self timer is 2 seconds, and you may miss the action… in this case, set your shutter to 30 seconds and use the black cardboard as mentioned in number 6 above.

So there you have it… 9 tips for better fireworks photo’s… HAVE FUN!

Today’s iCandy – Mello Yellow

Sunrise over Bungan Head Beach on Sydney’s Northern Beaches. This is a nicely hidden beach that would probably be spared of masses of people as it is a little harder to get to, residents are the only ones aloud to drive down to the beach, for the rest of us mere mortals it is an easy downhill walk in, and a calf muscle busting walk out… enjoy!

Click on the photo to order yourself a print or to download (please see licensing for the rules!)

My 2012 Photojourney

Here is a selection of my Photojourney for 2012. It was a year of learning, up until this year I never had worked out what kind of photography I loved, I now have discovered Landscape and what I call HDR Plus – The music is from around 1995 when I was in a band called ‘Sagacity’, I wrote the music and played guitar on the track, My cousin Darrin wrote and sang lyrics, his brother Matt played Bass and and another cousin, Brad played drums… a bit of a family affair! It was a lot of fun so I thought I would share it along with my photojourney for 2012… enjoy!

I hope you have a fantastic day…

I would like to wish you all a very Merry Christmas. It has been a fantastic year. Today is a day to spend with your loved ones, have a little lunch (okay, a big one) and a few Christmas drinks… stay safe and enjoy your day.

A nice time to reflect

At this time of year I have more time on my hands and I always find myself starting to reflect on the year that was, and 2012 has been a fantastic year. I started this blog back in March, along with a Facebook page, then as the year went on, I started to use other social media tools and now I have somewhere around 5000 people that I have connected with. I have over 230 Posts, 25 pages and nearly 100 comments…

Some of the highlights (in no particular order, well yes they are, in the order that I remember them… he he)

I attended the biggest ever Google+ photowalk and met some cool people

I discovered Trey Ratcliff and his cool HDR style of photography, then I was lucky enough to meet Trey himself here in Sydney.

I held 3 photowalks of my own – 2 of them jointly with Rob Potter from Photography Hot Spots and had about 75 people attend in total

I made some amazing new friends

I learnt a lot…

I travelled to China and photographed the Great Wall of China and other cool chinese places and people.

I dropped my D700 and broke it… then replaced it with a D800… YAY!

I wrote and published my first photography eBook

I became a contributor to a HDR magazine (HDR one)

I learnt to do my own picture framing

I finally won a 14-24mm f2.8 on eBay! (they’re as rare as rocking horse poo…)

My photo’s have been featured on several sites and most recently, the front and back covers of a 2013 calendar!

And I learn’t more… (I don’t think the learning will ever stop!)

Most of all, you have followed and supported me in 2012… I am flattered that anyone would want to follow my photojourney, let alone buy my images (I get a buzz every time someone does!)

So thanks for a great 2012, I am looking forward to 2013 and can’t wait to see where my photojourney will take me!

Merry Christmas friends… stay safe and keep it real!

Ben

Today’s iCandy – View House

Yesterday I headed to the Northern beaches with Rene, one of the many great friends I have made this year. He wanted to head over to Bungan Head Beach for sunrise. As we arrived it was clear that it wasn’t going to be the most sensational sunrise we had ever seen. The first thing I spotted was this large area of yellow blooming flowers. I am not sure what they are but they looked great and I had to work out how to capture them.

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My Christmas Wish sung by Gina Jeffreys

Ken Duncan, one of the many great photographers that inspire me has created this video, Merry Xmas!

Today’s iCandy – Opera Crystal

I took this back when Trey Ratcliff was in Sydney. He ran a photowalk here and whilst the weather looked gloomy, clouds always add something to an image. I used photomatix to process this one, if you want to buy photomatix for yourself, I have arranged a coupon for you to get 15% off. All you have to do is enter the code ‘ON3LEGS’ when you check out of the HDRsoft shopping cart and you automatically get the discount! They also have a free trial version so you can try before you buy if you’re not sure… have fun!

Click on the photo to order yourself a print or to download (please see licensing for the rules!)

A commonly asked question

One of the most common questions I have been asked is “what lens should I get next?”, and there is no easy answer… it’s funny how once I had a couple of lenses people think I can answer these questions… why do you think I have all the lenses I possibly can get my hands on… because even I am never sure what lens I will use next, so it’s best just to have them all! With Christmas just around the corner maybe it’s time to treat yourself… you can check out my PAGE HERE where I show you my kit and over you some advice on choosing your next lens, Merry Christmas!

Free Facebook Cover Images

Just a reminder if you head over to my Facebook Page you will find an album I am slowly filling up with Facebook covers you can use (I try to add a new one each day). I pick one of my favourite quotes and put it on one of my images, then format it to fit the Facebook cover so all you have to do is right click the image and save it to your computer, then you can upload it as your cover image.

Today’s iCandy – Bird Cage Alley

I took this one after the last on3legs photowalk in 2012. Myself and Rob Potter from Photography Hot Spots were wandering back to the car, and I guess, being the photographers we are, we always see photo opportunities… I had noticed that Rob had stopped about 20 metres behind me, and he was staring down an alley with an excited grin on his face… of course, I had to go back and see what it was…

Click on the photo to order yourself a print or to download (please see licensing for the rules!)